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PAMPHLETS 
OH 


THF  COUNTRY  CHURCH 


»   *  9      9 


Volume  3 


J  <£v 


(  o    9 


v.  3 


Federal  souneil  of  the  churches  of  Christ  in 
America,  What  every  church  should  know  about 
its  community. 

General  Association  of  Congregational  Churches 
of  Massachusetts •  Advance  reports  of  various 
committees,  1908  and  1909 

McElfresh,  F,  The  country  Sunday  school 

MclTutt,  M.  B.  Modern  methods  in  the  country  church 

McNutt ,  M.  B.  A  post-graduate  school  with  a  purpose 

Massachusetts  Federation  of  Churches-  Quarterly 
"bulletin*  Facts  and  factors.  October  1910 
"The  part  of  the  church  in  rural  progress  as 
discussed  at  the  Amherst  Conference . w 

Root,  E.  T*  State  federations 

Taft,  A.  B«  The  mistress  of  the  rural  manse 

Taft,  A.  B.  The  tent  mission 

Taylor,  G.  Basis  for  social  evangelism  with  rural 
applications 

Wells,  G.  F,  An  answer  to  the  Hew  England  country 
church  question, 

Wells,  G*  F.  What  our  country  churches  need 

Wilson,  W,  H.  The  church  and  the  transient 

Wilson,  W.  H*  Conservation  of  boys 

Wilson,  W.  H.  The  country  church 

Wilson,  W.  H.  The  country  church  program 

Wilson,  W*  H.  Don't  breathe  on  the  thermometer 

Wilson,  W.  H.  The  farmers'  church  and  the  farmers* 
,'v  college 

co    Wilson,  W.  II.  Getting  the  worker  to  church 


Wilson,  W,  H.  The  girl  on  the  farm 

Wilson,  W.  H.  How  to  manage  a  country  life 
institute 

Wilson,  W.  H.  "Marrying  the  land." 

Wilson,  W.  H.  ITo  need  to  "be  poor  in  the  country 

Wilson,  W»  H.  Synod's  opportunity 

Wilson,  W.  H.  What  limits  the  rural  Evangel 


«3«9   3?«<» 


The  church  and  country  life.  Pamphlet  issued 
"by  the  Board  of  Home  Missions  of  the  Presby- 
terian Church. 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2011  with  funding  from 

Boston  Library  Consortium  Member  Libraries 


http://www.archive.org/details/synodsopportunit03wils 


Department  of  Church  and  Labor,  the  Board  of  Home  Missions 
of  the  Presbyterian  Churchinthe  U.S.A. ,156  Fifth  Ave.,  NewYork 

Synod's  Opportunity 

By   WARREN    H.   WILSON,    Ph.D. 


The  state  of  the  country  churches 
offers  to  the  great  Synods  of  the  Pres- 
byterian Church  the  opportunity  of 
their  history.  The  country  churches 
are  said  to  have  supplied  two-thirds  of 
the  ministers  and  three-fourths  of  the 
elders  in  the  city  churches.  Some 
among  them  maintain  the  spiritual 
strength  of  the  past.  A  few  country 
churches  are  leading  in  financial  and 
moral  influence  as  in  the  old  time.  The 
greater  number,  however,  of  the  coun- 
try churches  are  in  distress.  Their  min- 
isters are  so  ill-paid  as  to  be  almost  en- 
slaved, while  the  communities  in  which 
the  churches  are  placed  have  prospered 
greatly.  The  changes  in  population 
about  the  country  church  have  altered 
the  position  once  held  by  these 
churches  and  disturbed  the  forces  of 
the  community  in  a  way  to  which  the 
country  churches  have  been  exceed- 
ingly sensitive.  A  complete  reconstruc- 
tion of  country  churches  is  needed  in 
the  leading  agricultural  states. 

In  these  leading  states  the  Synod  is 
a  missionary  organization  independent 
of  the  Board  of  Home  Missions.  These 
great  Synods  have  their  opportunity  in 


the  fact  that  the  problems  of  the  coun- 
try church  differ  in  a  sufficient  degree 
throughout  the  country  so  that  a  pecu- 
liar solution  is  needed  for  each  of  the 
great  states.  The  problem  of  the 
country  church  is  too  great  for  the 
Presbytery,  because  generally  the 
Presbytery  is  either  wholly  relieved 
from  this  problem  by  the  urban  char- 
acter of  its  churches  or  is  wholly  im- 
mersed in  this  problem  when  its 
churches  are  rural,  and  the  Presbytery 
is  helpless  in  the  face  of  a  problem  so 
extensive  and  so  uniform  throughout 
the  whole  State.  The  agencies  of  the 
General  Assembly,  moreover,  are  too 
purely  national  in  scope  to  do  more 
than  initiate  a  policy  for  the  solution 
of  the  country  church  situation.  The 
Board  of  Home  Missions  can  provide 
expert  assistance  in  training  men  for 
service  in  the  various  states,  but  in 
these  prosperous  agricultural  states 
the  missionary  responsibility  belongs 
to  the  Synods. 

For  this  service  the  Synod  is  pre- 
cisely fitted.  It  has  sufficient  author- 
ity with  which  to  impress  the  churches 
of  a  community  and  if  necessary  to  en- 
force its  policy  in  co-operation  with 
the  Presbytery.  The  Synod's  duty 
to  minister  to  missionary  situations 
throughout  the  State  is  recognized. 

The  reconstruction  of  country 
churches  may  be  effected  by  the  em- 
ployment of  rural  revivalists  under  the 


direction  of  the  State  Superintendent. 
These  men  should  be  trained  for  their 
work,  and  unless  they  can  perform  that 
task  they  should  not  hold  their  jobs. 
Their  task  should  be  the  conversion  of 
the  country  church  through  the  revival 
of  individual  souls  to  a  higher  standard 
of  country  life.  The  rural  revivalist 
should  spend  about  a  fortnight  in  each 
community  in  order  to  reach  every  re- 
motest member  of  the  church  and  of 
the  countryside.  Coming  to  a  decadent 
church  in  a  prosperous  community 
after  two  weeks'  service  he  should 
leave  a  regenerated  church  supported 
by  an  enthusiastic,  inspired  and  in- 
structed people. 

These  men,  the  agents  of  the  Synod, 
should  be  experts  not  only  in  personal 
religion — for  they  must  be  men  of  de- 
voted evangelistic  spirit — but  in  a  new 
Standard  of  Life  for  the  country  com- 
munity. 

First — In  the  financial  reconstruc- 
tion of  the  habits  of  the  people  they 
should  consecrate  the  new  economic 
prosperity  which  is  coming  to  the 
farmers.  Systematic  giving  is  funda- 
mental to  church  life  in  modern  or- 
ganized society.  Thus  the  country 
church  which  languishes  through  bad 
methods  and  untrained  consciences 
shall  become  the  training  school  for 
benevolence  on  the  farm. 

Second — The  rural  revivalist  shall  be 
an  ethical  leader.    He  shall  know  thor- 


oughly  the  meaning  and  the  future  of 
temperance  reform.  He  shall  under- 
stand the  value  of  the  Sabbath  to  work- 
ing people.  He  shall  be  able  to  guide 
a  community  sinking  in  impurity  into 
a  sane  and  well-ordered  moral  life.  He 
shall  be  a  moral  prophet  and  guide, 
able  to  put  the  stamp  of  God's  approval 
upon  a  contrite  population. 

Third — The  rural  revivalist  shall 
teach  the  Church  her  duty  not  merely 
to  souls,  but  to  institutions.  He  shall 
be  an  expert  in  federation  and  shall 
guide  the  regenerated  country  church 
into  co-operation  with  the  other 
churches  of  the  community,  with  the 
Grange,  the  Farmers'  Union  and  the 
Public  School.  He  shall  be  an  expert 
in  the  problem  of  consolidation  of  rural 
schools  and  shall  make  plain  to  the 
farmers  their  duty  to  their  children 
and  to  future  generations. 

Fourth — The  rural  revivalist  shall 
remind  the  country  of  her  former  popu- 
lation and  shall  show  to  the  country 
church  how  tenacious  is  her  hold  upon 
old  members.  Perhaps  his  revival  shall 
end  in  an  "Old  Home  Week"  Reunion 
of  former  members,  or  appoint  it 
within  the  year  following.  The  great- 
est resource  on  which  the  country 
church  can  draw  is  the  loyal  sentiment 
of  her  former  members,  which  is 
usually  neglected. 

Fifth — The  revivalist  of  the  country 
community  by  means  of  the  country 


church  shall  know  the  value  of  recre- 
ation as  a  form  of  public  moral  disci- 
pline. He  shall  be  able  to  teach  to 
the  Church  her  duty  to  the  social  life 
of  the  people,  not  merely  by  denounc- 
ing the  sins  which  go  with  rude,  rustic 
amusements,  but  by  advising  in  the 
constructive  promotion  of  the  ethical 
life  of  the  people  through  sane  and 
wholesome  recreations. 

Only  the  Synods  can  supply  for  the 
country  churches  of  their  respective 
districts  this  supervision  and  recon- 
struction. The  Presbyterian  Church 
has  laid  upon  them  the  missionary  duty 
within  their  territories.  For  the  con- 
ditions peculiar  to  each  State  men 
should  be  specially  trained.  For  the 
supervision  of  country  churches  the 
best  of  men  should  be  selected. 

The  training  of  these  men  will  in- 
volve a  special  problem  in  which  the 
Board  of  Home  Missions  can  render  a 
service,  because  of  its  national  scope. 
The  problem  of  the  country  church 
should  be  presented  to  the  theological 
seminaries  and  constantly  agitated 
throughout  the  country  in  order  to 
draw  to  the  service  of  the  country 
church  those  men  who  love  the  coun- 
try rather  than  the  city.  Annual  Coun- 
try Life  Institutes  should  be  held 
through  the  co-operation  of  the  Board 
of  Home  Missions  and  the  Synods, 
which  are  responsible  for  this  problem 
in  which  a  thorough  training  in  the 


problem  of  country  life  may  be  given 
to  the  men  who  offer  themselves  for 
service  in  supervision  and  reconstruc- 
tion of  country  churches  and  for  the 
country  pastorate. 

The  whole  policy  contemplates  a 
new  Standard  of  Country  Life.  It 
means  the  use  of  the  splendid  Presby- 
terian organization  to  create  a  new 
state  of  mind  throughout  the  rural  dis- 
tricts. It  is  a  task  as  great  as  that  ac- 
complished in  the  past  twenty  years  by 
the  temperance  reformers,  but,  with  a 
machinery  already  prepared  and  provi- 
dentially fitted  for  this  very  task,  it 
should  be  accomplished  in  far  less  time 
than  the  results,  great  as  they  are, 
which  the  temperance  reformers  have 
brought  about.  The  promotion  of  the 
moral,  social  and  spiritual  life  of  coun- 
try people  through  the  widely  extended 
agencies  of  the  Presbyterian  Church  is 
not  impossible.  It  is  worthy  of  the  de- 
voted energies  of  all  the  aggressive 
agencies  of  the  Church,  because  the 
attainment  by  the  country  churches  of 
a  higher  standard  of  life  in  harmony 
with  modern  scientific  agriculture  is 
fundamental  to  the  prosperity  of  the 
Church  in  America  and  will  be  largely 
influential  in  creating  the  type  of  citi- 
zenship for  the  next  generation. 


TEE  WILLETT  ffcESS,  N.  Yi 


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